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One of the best ways of foreseeing the future is to understand the human nature. Our needs, hopes, problems and dreams are often the basis for our future making. The nature of the human being is one of the most important ingredients in a complicated gambling business. Each of the parties - a casino and a gambler, long to win money from each other. And the growing strain will determine the future of the game.

Blackjack before 1962:

Before publication of the classic book “Beat The Dealer” by Edward O. Thorp in 1962 no single player had ever suspected of such a thing as the Basic Strategy. Everyone used one’s own mixture of superstitions concerning the way in which one or the other hand had to play. Plus, some experience gained while playing at home in the kitchen. Excluding a small number of professional card-players who intuitively presupposed that their overbalance would be more if there were more bowers left in a pack, practically none won in blackjack. Naturally, casinos felt quite comfortable under such conditions. Till 1962 blackjack was not very popular, though percentagewise the profit rate was exclusively high.

The next decade: from 1962 till 1972:

After publication of the book by Thorp the situation changed radically. When the book mounted the peak of sales, became a bestseller, and the professor Thorp became an internationally famous personality, casinos were terrified that thus everyone could learn the system of Thorp and would start beating casinos winning huge amounts of money.

The results of this panic are well-known. The majority of casinos cardinally changed the blackjack rules creating even a larger overbalance in comparison with the previous set of rules. These introductions were effective a few weeks only as the majority of casinos’ clients simply refused to play a game with such bad rules. Subordinating to the law of supply and demand casinos had to quickly restore traditional rules for all. After this gamblers started immediately to play again, more than that in considerably larger quantities.

The popularity of Thorp’s book played into the hands of casinos. Blackjack started to attract crowds of people who thought they could “beat a dealer” only after they had read one book.

But the fact remained that casinos’ visitors continued to lose the same amounts of money while playing blackjack as before. Only the number of gamblers increased a hundred times. The majority of those who had read the book simply didn’t understand the way the calculation of tens given in the book worked, and those who got to the bottom didn’t take enough pains so as to master the system of calculation from A to Z. Casinos observed in surprise the incredibly increased profits.

Reedition of the book in 1966 gave a reader a simpler calculation system. Over that period of time a number of books on blackjack were published. The game gathered pace. Casinos were setting more and more tables. Blackjack was becoming the most popular game in casinos having outrun the previous leader craps.

Blackjack of the 70s:

The classic book “Playing Blackjack as a Business” by Lawrence Revere is responsible for further increase in popularity of the game in the 70s to a great extent. Revere published a shortened version of his systems at the beginning of 1969, but by 1972 already thousands of copies of the book were sold out. Revere republished an extended version of the book offering his simple and effective systems of the game which increased blackjack popularity even more.

Also the book “Winning Blackjack” by Stanley Roberts, was in the right place at the right time, in addition the author appeared in a number of radio and TV-shows. Roberts invested a considerable amount of money into advertising of his book making a splash.

Casinos were once again overcome by the fit of paranoia. They started to suspect that the systems developed with the help of research methods could considerably influence their profits. Casinos started to introduce a multi-pack blackjack instead of a one-pack blackjack to struggle against the system game.

At the beginning of the 70s a lot of scientists, mathematicians, university professors and other “intellectuals” started to write books about blackjack. Some of them developed their own cards’ calculation systems. One of the most popular and effective systems - Hi-Opt I, was developed in 1974 with the help of computer programs created by Julian Brown with participation of an anonymous postgraduate of a large Canadian university.

A lot of professional gamblers transferred from the Revere system to the Hi-Opt I system because of the relative simplicity and effectiveness of the latter one. A lot of ordinary gamblers started to use the system together with the basic strategy. These two systems evidently made the biggest impact upon casinos’ profits because of their use by professionals. Roberts’ systems were more often used by amateurs.

Kenneth Uston, teams and Great Horror:

Kenneth Uston noticed sometime at the end of 1976 that he was amazed by the way how effective the simplest systems of Hi-Opt I type could be. In Uston’s book “Big Player“the way how Uston and his companions won together more than a million of dollars playing blackjack is described. Later on his teams transferred from very complicated systems to the simplest of Hi-Opt I type. Uston was thrown out of a few big casinos of Las Vegas, and he filed lawsuit against them for a total amount of 80 million dollars.

With the arrival of Uston the whole new era of blackjack began. Casinos were once again frightened that teams could win huge amounts of money in blackjack. Nearly at once some casinos did away with a one- and two-pack blackjack transferring to 4-, 6- and 8-pack ones. For an average gambler blackjack became too difficult. Plus, casinos started to cut most cards out of play - to two packs. As has been mentioned by Roberts in one of his articles, such practice was at the very least doubtful. By the way, the fact itself of availability of cards which didn’t enter the game caused new kinds of crooked gambling connected with withdrawal and addition of cards.

Casinos up to now change the number of packs and the extent of cutting, and compare levels of profits, thus balancing rules. In any case, rules are extremely difficult for gamblers in the USA, especially beginners.

The nightmare continues:

The funniest thing is that gamblers’ thoughts are not rigid. Uston’s teams were followed by Keith Taft with his pocket computer for blackjack which played better than any profs in the world. The court of Nevada State broke the record of the USA on the quickness of adoption of statute on use of computers in casinos. Up to five years with confiscation in the current situation, though Taft and his advocates were sure of the unconstitutionality of that law.

Forbade the computer? There appeared Tommy Hyland and his most complicated systems of tracking. A new headache for casinos… To worsen the cutting, introduce more packs and make the procedure of riffle even longer. To invent shuffle-machines!

Stanford Wong was the first to outwit these shuffle-machines. The most important thing was to know how they worked. Poor casinos didn’t know what to do. These machines cost rather a lot.

Perhaps new varieties would help? Spanish 21, Super-fan 21, 6:5 blackjack, “Open” blackjack, Blackjack-switch, Pontoon… With every introduction there was one problem: either no one played it at all or profs immediately found the way to beat it. Tournaments? Old Wong created teams especially for tournament struggle. Every new rule was calculated and intensively looked into a week in advance. The development of the Internet caused quick information distribution.

Further on the whole pleiad of gamblers of the contemporary generation came on stage. Wong, Sneider, Anderson, Dogerty, Shlesinger and heaps of people who were occupied with theory and practical aspects of the game. Mathematical models of the game were worked out. Texts on Blackjack were published in scientific reviews.

Finally, up to the present moment a small number of professionals still win in blackjack. And will win in the future. Some profs transfer to more complicated systems which are plentiful (let’s say, Hi-Opt II was published as far back as 1976). New methods and techniques are being developed.

There is no doubt that it will get still more and more difficult to win in blackjack. However, there difficulties only make gambling wits work harder and harder. Right away new game systems are being worked out in many heads and at many computers of the world.

It is important to understand that gamblers always have a hope. They can change games. They can finally read a textbook on the theory of probability. They can read the same books themselves. They can spend even more money on the newest technologies. However, I assure You, there will always be a way to beat them.

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Casino Reviews

If you have used a photographic service that specializes in portraiture for kids, you already know that it can be an expensive proposition. Furthermore you will only be offered prints from a very limited number of exposures. Even if you like the results (there’s usually at least one photo you have to have) your photographs will look like stock images. There is little creativity displayed in the portraits that come out of studios. After all, if the photographer has known your child for only a few short minutes, how can he or she capture their essence?

With a little effort on your part, and some patience, it is possible to create portrait shots of your children, whether infants or toddlers, or older, that really stand out and which you will treasure for decades.

Photographing Infants

Until they can get onto their feet, or hands and knees, and make their way out of the frame, you are dealing with an infant. This is the one great advantage that infants offer over toddlers: they aren’t going anywhere, so you can take as much time as you need to get the shot.

Contrary to the approach of the professional kids photographer, the one thing you will not need to put together to get started is a studio. But you will need to gain mastery over your lighting conditions. This need not be overly difficult. Look around your home for a large window, preferably a low-set one, through which an abundance of light pours in from outside. Not direct sunlight, of course. If that’s the case, you’ll need to find another window, or do the shoot at another time of the day.

You will be using the area in front of the window, about six feet back from it, as your staging area. So clear away any furniture and give yourself lots of room to move around. You will be shooting pictures side-on to the window, so that the light is streaming in either from your direct left or right. Your child will likewise be sitting sideways to the window, or slightly facing it so that one half, or three-quarters of their head is strongly illuminated. Remember, this is not direct light you are using, so there are not going to be any shadows. But there will be gradations of natural light that add depth to your images.

Set up a play area for your child. Use a large white sheet, or blanket if you have one, to cover the floor, and dress your child in light-colored clothing. I suggest waiting until your child is at least old enough to sit up and occupy themselves with a toy before doing photo shoots, but it’s not absolutely required. If you will be photographing a child unable to crawl, your best bet for a good photograph is to get down on the floor and photograph from their level.

Otherwise the easiest approach is to set up a tripod, frame the scene to be photographed, and then you can work away from the camera, using a cable to fire remotely when you see the shot. You don’t need to be obsessed with having your child look into the camera for every shot. That’s unlikely to happen unless you are playing peek-a-boo with the camera (which is certainly not a fruitless approach). If you catch them looking up, thoughtfully, or looking out the window, or looking at you, get the shot.

Do not use a flash to get your shots. You want natural lighting only. To be able to shoot like this you’ll need a fast lens, like a 50mm prime lens, such as an f/1.4, opened up to maximum aperture, or a stop less to gain extra depth of field. Be sure to focus on your child’s eyes, the only part of the image that absolutely has to be rendered sharply.

Use common sense when choosing whether or not to begin photographing. If your son or daughter are not in the best mood, shut the session down and come at it another time. If you persist in trying to get pictures when there is no chance of a smile, then the only result can be lackluster images and an unfortunate sense that this waste of time is probably not worth repeating in the future, which would be a shame for not only you but everyone else in the family who is likely to enjoy your photos for years to come.

Photographing Toddlers

Once your child is on the move, getting a great shot can be challenging, as they rarely want to remain still for you. But there are things you can do to improve your chances of success.

If you are very lucky, and have been blessed with that rare child that can appreciate the value of a good photograph, or at the very least is receptive to instruction, you can dress them up and pose them in naturally lighted scenes. But good luck to that. They might do it once, but their fascination with the process is likely to fade by the second session.

So you might want to consider giving up on the idea of a structured session. Instead, think about what it is that your child likes to do, and make it your goal to capture candid shots. Your best chance of making this happen is to photograph them while they are highly absorbed in an activity they love.

Again, use a fast lens to take pictures in natural lighting. I recommend a 50mm prime lens, and then cropping the image in your imaging software if you have captured too much of the background. Prime lenses can be very sharp optically, and if you are shooting fast (low shutter duration times of 1/125th of a second or less) you should not be seeing many blurred shots. If you do, consider increasing the ISO setting on your camera to make your image sensor more sensitive to light. This adds graininess to your images, but a grainy shot can be quite acceptable. A blurred shot never is.

When you compose your images, look for the moment when an emotion plays across your child’s face. It really does not matter too much what the emotion is. Bemusement, surprise, the wrinkled face of suspicion when they catch you watching them. Sudden joy, or even a moment of thoughtful reflection. You can take great photographs of your child eating a waffle, using a long stick to poke with reservation at a crab, or simply building with pride their tallest rock pile ever. Fortunately the possibilities are endless.

Consider also the possibility of converting some of your images into black and white. Desaturating the color spectrum often helps to improve the photojournalism aspects of a photograph, and in a very real sense, this is what toddler photography is all about - recording their journey through childhood.

To help you select a suitable digital camera to get started with, I have put together an article for you about how to find the right Beginner Digital Camera.

Whether you need a simple point-and-shoot model, or a more complex digital SLR model, you will find the answers, and greatly discounted digital camera offers, at http://www.bestdigitalcameradiscounts.com/

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